Читать книгу By Right of Conquest - Arthur Hornblow - Страница 3

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In a dark, dirty, foul-smelling room back of a small ship-chandler's store on West Street, four sailormen were seated at a table, drinking, quarreling, cursing. The bottle from which they had imbibed too freely contained a villainous compound that ensured their host a handsome profit, set their brains afire, and degraded them to the level of the beast. Not that their condition in life was much better than that of the dumb brute. Animals often enjoy more creature comforts, are better housed and more kindly treated.

They were not really sailors, for in their long experience on the high seas they had never reefed a sail or hauled on a rope. Only too often they never got so much as a glimpse of God's blue sky or the immense stretches of tumbling, foaming ocean. They were the galley-slaves of modern seagoing—the stokers, the men with oily skin and heat-bleared eyes, who toil naked in the bowels of the giant steamship, each crew doing its "watch" of four hours in a dark pit at the bottom of the huge vessel, deprived of air and sunlight, firemen and trimmers working feverishly in a maddening temperature of 140 degrees and over, thrusting and pulling with rod and rake in the insatiable maw of the raging furnace. The hot blasts scorch the men's faces and blister their skins, yet they are compelled to keep up the furious pace. They must never slacken, for on their muscles and their nerves depend the speed of the ship and the prestige of the line. So they shovel faster and faster, tirelessly, endlessly, the flying coal-dust settling on their sweating faces and bare bodies until they lose semblance to anything human and recall those lurid pictures of the Inferno in which Satan's imps, armed with pitch-forks, thrust back shrieking sinners, condemned to everlasting torment, who are struggling to escape from the bottomless pit. That the luxurious liner may break a record and retain the patronage of the millionaire passengers reclining indolently on the promenade-decks above, the unknown, unseen slaves in the hellish regions below must shovel, shovel, shovel, always faster, faster until at last nature gives way. Exhausted by fatigue, overcome by the killing heat, the man falls headlong. They pick him up and carry him on deck, where the pure air may or may not revive him. Perhaps he is already dead. His filthy, almost unearthly appearance chills the sympathies of the fastidious cabin passengers. Who is he? What's happened? "Only a stoker!" yawns some one, and all go unconcernedly down to dinner.

The time passed and the men still loafed in the chandler's shop, drinking and arguing. The day was already advanced, the active, busy world without summoned them urgently to duty, at noon their ship would cast off her moorings and steam majestically out to sea, and yet the four firemen sat idly in the evil-smelling den, noisy in drunken argument—all but one man, a big, athletic-looking fellow, who drank in sullen silence. Occasionally one of them would stop and glance furtively in the direction of the street, as if apprehensive that an unwelcome visitor might suddenly put in an appearance.

But no one disturbed them, not even Schmalz, the proprietor of the place, a fat, tousled-headed German, who found his customers too profitable to quarrel with. As fast as bottles were emptied, he replaced them, and that he sold liquor without going through the formalities of procuring a license was evident from his catlike movements, the absence of any outward signs of the clandestine traffic, and his extreme care to keep the inner room and its occupants well secluded from observation.

The outer shop was typical of the many nautical stores of its kind scattered along New York's waterfront. It contained everything a sailor needs, from yellow oilskins, thick woolen socks, and blue jerseys to fried herrings, pickles, and mustard plasters. The atmosphere was heavy with an agglomeration of different and conflicting smells—fish, tar, paint, garbage, and stale tobacco. From time to time customers dropped in, and Schmalz, shrewd and urbane, exercised his talents inducing them to buy, the while keeping one cautious eye on his open money-drawer, the other on his boisterous patrons in the inner room.

From the street came refreshing whiffs of salty air and the roar of heavy traffic rolling along the busy thoroughfare. Trucks groaning and creaking under mountains of merchandise, cabs filled with travelers and piled high with baggage, slowly threading their way in and out to trains and steamers, rickety horse-cars, crowded to the guard-rails, hucksters' push-carts, piled high with decaying fruit, bewildered immigrants, fresh from the Old World, nimble commuters from the suburbs hurrying to and from the ferries—all these, men, horses, and vehicles were tangled up in seeming hopeless confusion. Along the water's edge, where the four-mile line of docks sheltered the world's shipping, arose a forest of ship-masts, with here and there gigantic funnels of ocean liners, belching smoke as they made ready for their journey to the sea. From mid-river came the shrill tooting of mosquito-like tugs, and the churning sound of ferry-boats as they glided from shore to shore.

"Naw, Jack, my boy, it's too blarsted risky," said decisively one of the four, a short, stocky man, with a pock-marked face and cockney accent. "'Tain't no good arguin' an' chewin' the rag any longer, ye know. I won't do it, an' that's all there's to it."

"Shorty's dead right," spoke up another of the men, as he drained his glass. "We'd be caught, sure as yer name's Jack Armitage."

"Bah!" grunted the third man. "Wot's the good of kickin'? If it isn't one thing, it's another—so wot's the use?"

The foregoing remarks were directed principally at the big, straight-limbed fellow who sat at the table in sullen silence, his face buried in his folded arms. He vouchsafed no answer to his comrades' arguments. Lifting his head, he turned his bloodshot eyes on them, and, as if to show his utter contempt for their opinion, he shrugged his massive shoulders and, picking up the whiskey-bottle, refilled his glass.

Apparently a few years younger than his associates, he was a clean-cut, good-looking fellow with a smooth face, and regular features, and there was something in his manner, an air of authority in the toss of his head, which suggested that he might be fashioned of a different clay, yet his grimy skin and oil-stained, coal-blackened clothes indicated that his condition of life was the same. His eyes were red from drinking and there were grim lines about his mouth that prompted his companions to leave him to himself. They knew their customer.

In the stokers' forecastle Jack Armitage had made himself quickly known as a man whom it was unwise to monkey with. Directly he joined the ship, he gave them to understand that clearly. The cock of the boiler-room, a bully who had heretofore run things to suit himself, rashly started an argument with the newcomer, and before he knew what had hit him, he was a fit subject for the hospital. Quick to admire physical strength, his comrades respected Armitage after that episode, and they nicknamed him Gentleman Jack, because his English was straighter than theirs and because he appeared to have known better days. Sometimes they hailed him as "Handsome," because of his shape, regular features and wavy hair. Of his history they knew nothing, and seeing that he was moody and uncommunicative, no one ventured to arouse his wrath by asking questions that he might consider too personal. Besides, no one cared. There's no "Who's Who?" in a steamer's stoke-hold. A natural refuge for the scum of the cities—for those wanted by the police as well as for those who have failed—even a detective will hesitate to follow his quarry into the red jaws of hell itself. To this, as much as anything else, the stoke-hold owes its reputation as the modern Sanctuary.

So they let Armitage alone. He did his "shift" along with the rest, gaining promotion first as coal-passer, then as trimmer, then as fireman. His services were valued because of his great strength and power of endurance. He could go on raking and pulling out fires long after his mate had fallen back exhausted. But with his superiors he was not very popular. Discontented, intolerant of discipline, mutinous, he was nearly always in trouble, and, owing to his violent, uncontrollable temper, quarrels were incessant even with his comrades. They feared him more than they loved him, and perhaps this explained why his present attempt to induce them to desert ship just before sailing-time had not met with much success.

The first speaker went on:

"They'll catch ye, it's a cinch! Then it'll go hard wid ye. 'Tain't no worser for you than for the rest of us. The boiler-room's bad enough, I grant ye that, but it's a darn sight better than goin' to jail. What do you say, Dutch?" he demanded, turning to another.

Armitage maintained his sulky silence. The man called "Dutch," a lantern-jawed chap with red hair and a squint, expectorated a long stream of saliva on the floor before replying. Shifting his quid, he said:

"I guess Shorty's right, Jack. I ain't no fonder of doin' the suicide act in that hell-hole than ye is yerself. I'd quit right now, and never want to see the sight of a bloomin' ship again. But we've signed for the voyage, ain't we? We must grin and bear it for another trip. The law gives 'em the right on us. I'm goin' back now, before I'm taken back. What d'ye say, Bill?"

Bill, already half-seas over, nodded in a stupid, maudlin manner. He had drunk so much that he could hardly keep his head up, and the words came thickly from his lips:

"Desert ship?—hie! No, siree! Hie! Ye remember—Robinson, who tried to beat it at Naples? Hie! They didn't do a thing to him—almost fed the bloody furnace with him, that's all! No, siree, no pier-head jumps for me!"

The clock in the outer shop struck eleven. Shorty jumped to his feet.

"Say, lads!" he exclaimed, with another nervous glance toward the street. "The blessed ship sails in another hour. We'll be missed and they'll be after us, sure as yer born. I'm goin' back right now. Who's comin'?"

Bill and "Dutch" staggered with difficulty to their feet. While Shorty settled accounts with the urbane Schmalz, "Dutch" turned to Armitage, who remained seated at the table.

"Ain't ye goin' back, Jack?" he demanded, as he shot with expert aim another stream of saliva into Schmalz's cracked cuspidor.

Armitage raised his head and glared at them. There was a look in his face that made "Dutch" wince. Hoarsely, savagely he burst out:

"You call yourselves men! You're nothing but a lot of white-livered, whining curs! You've had a taste of hell in that ship, and you want to go back and endure another three months of it, because you haven't manhood enough to put an end to it. I'll not sail, I tell you. They'll never take me back, do you hear?"

"Does ye mean ye goin' to desert?" demanded Shorty, eyeing the big fellow with astonishment.

The other two men stared at him, open-mouthed. "Dutch" scratched his head, and, to better conceal his emotion, let go another flyer of saliva at the cuspidor. Then, with great deliberation, he bit off another chew of tobacco, and said, with a nasal drawl:

"P'r'aps we might make so bold as to inquire of the gen'l'man what 'ee's goin' ter do fer a livin'. I allus suspected he didn't 'ave ter work if 'ee didn't 'ave ter. But if 'ee's come in for a fortune 'ee might let 'is pals know summat about it."

"I guess 'ee's gwine ter be a bloomin' bondholder and cut his coupons!" grinned Bill, in a feeble attempt at jocularity.

Armitage bit his lip and scowled. He was in no humor for jests, and his hand moved dangerously in the direction of the empty whiskey-bottle. Bill ducked and the other men immediately gave the table a wider berth. Shorty cast another nervous glance at the clock.

"Come, boys," he said impatiently. "We ain't got no time to lose. Stop yer foolin', Armitage. Let's get back to the ship, or there'll be the devil to pay."

There was a moment of silent suspense. The other men looked toward Armitage, who did not stir. Shorty stepped forward and shook him by the arm. Armitage jerked himself free with an oath, and, raising his fist, powerful as a sledge-hammer, brought it down on the table with a force that made the glasses dance. His eyes literally blazed with fury as he turned on his comrades.

"Go and be damned!" he shouted. "Go back to the ship and tell 'em to count me out. I'll go to hell soon enough without getting hell here, too. Don't worry about what'll become of me. I guess I'll be all right. Anyhow, I'm not goin' back, do ye hear? If I was a coward, afraid to call my soul my own, like you fellows, it'd be different. But I ain't!"

Shorty flushed up. He had been a champion light-weight boxer before things went wrong and he took to the sea, and he resented this reflection on his personal courage. He had not yet had an encounter with Armitage, but he knew enough of the science of self-defense not to be as much intimidated by the big fellow as were the rest of his shipmates. Advancing spunkily, he retorted:

"No man ever yet called me a coward, 'Handsome,' an' I ain't goin' to take it from you. If it comes to a showdown, the coward's the chap as deserts 'is ship, not the chap as stands by 'is signed articles."

Armitage sprang to his feet, his six feet of athletic masculinity towering above them all.

"Clear out! Clear out!" he shouted, wildly waving his arms. "Clear out before I kill one of you!"

Bill and "Dutch" obeyed with almost ludicrous alacrity, and retreated into the outer shop, but Shorty pluckily stood his ground. Before Armitage could lay hands on him, the cockney closed to the attack, a sinewy arm shot out like a flash, and there was a thundering smack as the blow went home on Armitage's jaw.

For a brief moment the athlete staggered, but more from sheer surprise than anything else. Then, with a volley of fierce expletives, he made a savage rush at his adversary. The men clinched, arms and legs whirled around in a cyclone of dust, tables and chairs were sent crashing to all corners of the room. It was all over in a minute. By the time Schmalz, terrified by the noise of the fracas, ran in to see what was the matter, Shorty was lying on his back on the floor, bleeding profusely from the nose.

While Bill and "Dutch" helped the worsted ex-champion to a chair, Armitage coolly readjusted the rest of the scattered furniture, and, resuming his seat at the table, bellowed at Schmalz, who stood, open-mouthed:

"Don't stand grinning there, you blamed fool! Let's have some more whiskey. This scrapping makes one thirsty."

Schmalz hesitated. He stood in no little fear of his burly customer. On the other hand, it was dangerous to let him go on drinking. There was no telling what he might do. He looked from Shorty, who was trying to stop his nose-bleed, to the broken glasses on the floor.

"I guess you haf enough alretty yet," he growled.

Armitage struck the table viciously.

"Don't stand chinning there!" he shouted. "Bring some booze on the double quick, or it'll be the worse for you!"

With a helpless shrug of his shoulders, Schmalz went after more liquor. Shorty, partly recovered from the knock-out, staggered painfully to his feet and made for the door, followed by "Dutch" and Bill. When he reached the threshold, the defeated fireman turned and shook his fist at Armitage.

"Yer'll be sorry for this, 'Handsome'!" he shouted. "I'll get even with ye afore the day's out."

Armitage shrugged his shoulders by way of answer, and the three men slouched out. As Shorty passed Schmalz in the outer store, he said to the German in an undertone:

"Look out for him, d'ye hear? He's a bad 'un. He's not to be trusted!"

Jerking his thumb significantly in the direction of the cash-drawer, he whispered:

"He'd as soon cut your throat as not—for what ye've got there."

Schmalz turned pale. Shorty went on:

"I've got an account to square with him. Give him all the whiskey he wants. Keep him here until we can get back to the steamer. They'll come and nab him. Serve him right. He's better out of yer way."

"Ya-ya!" exclaimed Schmalz nervously, "But mach schnell, eh?"

The men hurried away, leaving their irate shipmate to his own reflexions. For a long time after their departure there reigned a perfect quiet, which seemed all the more intense by contrast with the recent turmoil. Schmalz, busy at his desk, absorbed in the arduous task of disentangling his accounts, gave no heed to his quarrelsome customer, who, now that the immediate cause of his irritation was removed, was inclined to be more amiable. His sullenness of manner disappeared and he seemed even willing to argue amicably with his host the merits of the recent affray. Schmalz paid no attention, yet the fireman talked on. It wasn't his fault, he insisted. Shorty had called him names, and he wouldn't stand that from any man. He knew what he was about. Flesh and blood simply couldn't stand that stoke-hold any longer. Only the last trip, one of the men collapsed under the strain. Seized with "stoker's madness," he had rushed to the deck and jumped overboard. He'd had enough of such horrors. He'd die rather than return to the ship.

"D'ye hear, Schmalz?" he shouted, to better attract his host's attention. "I tell ye I'm through with seagoing. They'll never get me back!"

Schmalz, however, turned a deaf ear. He was unwilling or else too busy to listen. So, finding that he had no one to whom he could impart his sorrows, Armitage turned once more to the whiskey-bottle, with the idea of drowning them. The strong liquor soon had the effect of making him drowsy. His head dropped heavily on his broad chest and his snores shook the room.

He might have slept in this way for hours without disturbance, only Schmalz clumsily dropped a tray, and the sudden crash aroused the stoker with a start. Rubbing his eyes, he turned eagerly to the clock, and a look of satisfaction overspread his face. The Atlanta would soon be on her way to the Mediterranean. Half an hour more and he would have nothing to fear. They would have sailed without him. Then he need skulk no longer in this den. He could go forth a free man, at liberty to do what he chose.

But as his befuddled brain began to clear, he grew uneasy. He knew the boiler-room was short-handed. They must have discovered his absence. Shorty and the others, in revenge, would be likely to peach on him and say where he was to be found. The officers would come after him and drag him back to that abominable stoke-hold. He knew enough of the shipping laws to be aware that they had the right. He being an English fireman in a foreign port, all they had to do was to go before the British consul and secure his arrest. Putting his hand to his hip pocket, he drew out a revolver and regarded lovingly its polished surface.

"My only friend!" he muttered. "Let 'em come! I'll give 'em all the fight they want—more than they want! I'll put a bullet through my own head rather than be dragged back to that stoke-hold!"

And if the Atlanta sailed without him—what then? He had had enough of the sea, that was certain, yet he must earn a living somehow. He hadn't a dollar in the world, and he knew no trade that he could turn his hand to. His life at sea had unfitted him for anything else. Even if he made the effort and let the whiskey alone, how could he seek employment looking as he did? With no linen and in his grimy, oil-stained clothes, he would be eyed everywhere with suspicion. Nobody would have anything to do with him. The world has no use for its failures, for men who are down on their luck. The outlook was hopeless, for he saw no way to improve his condition.

"It's easy to lose one's self-respect and sink into degradation," he muttered bitterly to himself; "and when at last you see your folly, then it's too late—it's impossible to get back. Pshaw! What's the good?"

With a shaking hand, he helped himself to another drink, grateful to the lethal liquor which dulled his thoughts. Yet, in spite of himself, his clouded brain remained active. Memory slipped back ten years. If only those years could be lived over again! How dearly he had paid for the follies which had brought him where he was! Wild oats? Yes—he had sown them in plenty, and a damnable harvest he had reaped! Things had gone from bad to worse, until one day came the crisis. He was down and out, almost starving, without a friend to extend a helping hand. After he had fasted forty-eight hours, and the river seemed to be the only way out, a barroom companion told him of a job as coal-passer on an ocean liner which was to be had for the asking. He jumped eagerly at the chance as a drowning man grasps at a drifting straw. At least, it would mean temporary food and lodging. He was strong as an ox and could stand the pace, no matter how hard the work was. Besides, hidden away in a steamer's stoke-hold, he reckoned out that he would be dead to the world. No one would think of seeking him there. The brutal work and brutal companions would help him to forget the past.

For five long years he had stood it, but he could endure it no longer. Five years of physical and mental torment, and the future—a hopeless blank. The old days were wiped out completely, every decent tie shattered forever. He could never redeem the past. He had joined the vast army of life's failures, which goes marching on, silently, grimly to perdition. The sooner the end came the better. He was weary of it all. The best way would be to make an end of it at once. He knew he had only himself to blame, but, like most men who have gone to the devil, he held society responsible. The world is without pity for those who make mistakes. The man who's down is given no mercy. They said he was quarrelsome, a trouble-maker. So he was. In all these years of suffering he had steeled his heart to hate his fellow man. He detested the rich, idle class because he held it accountable for his present miserable condition, and in obscure socialistic and anarchistic meetings in the slums of New York and London he had listened gloomily to the wild-eyed orators' frenzied teachings of class-hatred. His sufferings had embittered him against the whole human race. He had fought his way through it all fiercely, because the whole world seemed in league against him, every man and woman his enemy. The only law he knew was that enforced by a strong arm. The weaker had no rights. It wasn't his fault if he had to defend himself. He had given the world back what it gave him and with interest. That's why he hit back every time blindly, savagely.

With an unsteady hand, he took up the whiskey-bottle and started to refill his glass. His back was partly toward the door, so he could not see the front store suddenly darken by the abrupt entrance of four men who pushed their way unceremoniously past Schmalz and rushed into the room where he was sitting. Two of the newcomers were ship's officers, the others were policemen.

Armitage was taken completely by surprise. He knew at once that they had come for him. With an oath, he jumped to his feet and his right hand went quickly to his hip pocket. But before he could draw his gun, the officers and policemen threw themselves upon him and pinioned his arms.

"You'd better come quickly, Armitage, or it'll go harder with you!" said the senior officer sternly.

"What d'ye want with me?" demanded the fireman hoarsely.

"You're under arrest for desertion," replied his superior.

"Where d'ye want me to go?" stammered Armitage, his breath coming and going in short, spasmodic gasps.

"Back to the ship. Not as you're much good—only to give you your medicine," was the laconic rejoinder.

"Back to the ship! Never while I live!" shouted the big fellow.

By a superhuman muscular effort he threw off his four captors as easily as if they had been children, and made a dash for liberty through the store. But he was not yet clear of his foes. Seeing him coming, Schmalz quickly put out his foot, and the fugitive fell all his length to the floor. Before he could scramble to his feet again, the policemen were upon him, and soon had his arms securely pinioned.

"Quick, back to the ship with him!" commanded the senior officer. "She sails in ten minutes. We've just time to make it!"